Vaisser and Khmiadashvili win World Senior Championships
Written by Administrator
Sunday, 07 November 2010
The World Senior Championship has been held in two groups: open (224 participants, 11 rounds) and women (21 participants, 9 rounds).
GM Anatoly Vaisser (France, 2507)
In the open section the rating-favorite GM Tseshkovsky has been leading up to a certain point, but finished out of the top ten.
GM Anatoly Vaisser got gold, while three more players have also scored 8.5/11.
WGM Tamara Khmiadashvili (Georgia, 2162)
The rating-favorite in the women's section, the legendary GM Nona Gaprindashvili, was very close to winning the event for the second year in a row, but the tie-breaks favored WGM Tamara Khmiadashvili, who celebrated victory in the World Women Senior Championship for the 4th time in her career! WIM Tatyana Fomina has also scored 7/9.
The rules are simple - send us your questions and see them featured in the weekly Q&A column!
Q1: Let say you are playing in a tournament and there are players there that use the
same opening, but the difference is that one player is much stronger than the other. Let's
say in that tournament you have a strong idea or novelty against the opening used
by both players. You have play to play the weaker player first, would you use that
idea or novelty against that weaker player or save it later for the stronger player? A1: Nowadays the openings are being explored so quickly that it doesn't make much sense to hold off certain novelties. Get your point today before someone else does it tomorrow. Also, there are less "crushers" as opposed to the pre-computer era where you could find a move that changes the evaluation of the position from lost to won. Chess engines have changed the way we treat chess.
Q2: Have you encountered John's Nunn's "Chess Puzzle Book"? For a mere mortal like
me, the problems are very hard, but for a GM like you,would that book not give you
trouble of finding the solutions? A2: I haven't read this book, but I am sure the problems there should be sophisticated since Dr. GM Nunn is the reigning world chess problem solving champion. I also love solving chess studies, and there is a certain correlation between playing strength and the ability to solve problems (the stronger the player, the faster he untackles the problems). However, the opposite is not true. Some of the top problem solvers in the world are below master level in practical chess.
Q3: At GM or master level, is it really necessary for them to always prepare a novelty
for a match? A3: It's very important to be able to get a position that you like and the opponent doesn't. Such matches as Kasparov-Kramnik and Anand-Kramnik have been decided by luring the opponent onto one's home turf, making him feel uncomfortable, disappointed and helpless. Therefore, it's not a matter of knowing some magic moves in certain positions (as the public tends to think), but comprehensive opening systems aimed at outplaying the opponent.
Q4: When I play white with my PC I play really very good against a 2300-2400 Elo. But
when I play black I feel that my level decreases from +2200, to 2000 (or a bit less).
Is it "normal"? Do you feel it too? What should I do? A4: This is not normal at all. Most people score better with White than with Black, but the gap is normally within maybe 100 points. It's hard to imagine someone playing at master level as White, and at expert level as Black (as in your case). Could it be that you are playing inferior openings against the computer over and over again and losing game after game? The first step you should take is carefully analyse your games against the computer and search for repeating patterns to avoid making the mistakes in the future. If you get a slightly better position with White and a slightly worse one with Black, you should score about equal.
Q5: What chess literature have you been using for preparation before? And what about now? A5: Some time ago I compiled a non-comprehensive list of chess books that have influenced me a lot. Nowadays the most common types of chess literature that I'm reading are: 1) books on specific types of positions (e.g. with hanging pawns) 2) tactics and endgame studies 3) books that authors ask me to review 4) chess magazines (New in Chess, 64 Review, etc.) 5) other good chess books. Nonetheless, nowadays one has to spend more time analysing positions with the computer than shuffling through books' pages.
Q6: My rating used to be about 2000. I haven't had a chance to play otb for a few years, but have had extensive correspondence experience. I will be soon playing in a tournament, so what goal should I set before myself? A6: Generally speaking, it's VERY hard to return to otb play after quitting it for a few years, especially if you have practiced correspondence chess at that period. My advice would be not to be too hard on yourself. It is not possible to set Herculean goals under such conditions. Just make sure you prepare well psychologically, physically and in the chess sense. Try to enjoy the game and see how it goes. After finishing the tournament and diagnozing your weaknesses (that you may not be aware of since you didn't have them back then), you can find out where you are at and proceed to goal-setting and creating a new training plan. Good luck at the tournament!
Q7: When playing against the World right now, do you rely on your positional understanding, or follow the advice of chess engines? A7: Do not underestimate the power of the human brain. I prefer playing my own moves unless they are quickly refuted by the engines. I take a look at the position and find some ideas/plans. Then I try to implement them on the board. Sometimes it runs into a tactical refutation (computers are good at that). If not, then I just play my move without caring what the "best line" provided by the silicon beast is. Also, this is much more entertaining than simply comparing what different engines at different depths are suggesting without thinking about it yourself or learning something new. After all, the World is playing me, not my laptop.
Magnus Carlsen, the 19-year old Norwegian chess prodigy who is ranked #1 on the live chess ratings and widely recognized as one of the main candidates to become the next World Chess Champion, has sent an official letter to FIDE stating that he will not participate in the Candidates Matches next year.
To: FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov & FIDE World Championship Committee.
Reference is made to the ongoing World Championship cycle.
The purpose of this letter is to inform you of my decision not to take part in the planned Candidate Matches between March and May 2011.
After careful consideration I’ve reached the conclusion that the ongoing 2008–2012 cycle does not represent a system, sufficiently modern and fair, to provide the motivation I need to go through a lengthy process of preparations and matches and to perform at my best.
Reigning champion privileges, the long (five year) span of the cycle, changes made during the cycle resulting in a new format (Candidates) that no World Champion has had to go through since Kasparov, puzzling ranking criteria as well as the shallow ceaseless match-after-match concept are all less than satisfactory in my opinion.
By providing you with four months notice before the earliest start of the Candidates as well as in time before you have presented player contracts or detailed regulations, I rest assured that you will be able to find an appropriate replacement.
Although the purpose of this letter is not to influence you to make further changes to the ongoing cycle, I would like to take the opportunity to present a few ideas about future cycles in line with our input to FIDE during the December 27th 2008 phone-conference between FIDE leaders and a group of top-level players.
In my opinion privileges should in general be abolished and a future World Championship model should be based on a fair fight between the best players in the World, on equal terms. This should apply also to the winner of the previous World Championship, and especially so when there are several players at approximately the same level in the world elite. (Why should one player have one out of two tickets to the final to the detriment of all remaining players in the world? Imagine that the winner of the 2010 Football World Cup would be directly qualified to the 2014 World Cup final while all the rest of the teams would have to fight for the other spot.)
One possibility for future cycles would be to stage an 8-10 player World Championship tournament similar to the 2005 and 2007 events.
The proposal to abolish the privileges of the World Champion in the future is not in any way meant as criticism of, or an attack on, the reigning World Champion Viswanathan Anand, who is a worthy World Champion, a role model chess colleague and a highly esteemed opponent.
Rest assured that I am still motivated to play competitive chess. My current plan is to continue to participate in well-organised top-level tournaments and to try to maintain the no 1 spot on the rating list that I have successfully defended for most of 2010.
The annual Tal Memorial super tournament will be taking place in Moscow, Russia from November 4th to 15th. It's a round robin featuring 10 top grandmasters from all over the world:
1. Aronian, 2801, Armenia
2. Kramnik, 2791, Russia
3. Grischuk, 2771, Russia
4. Mamedyarov, 2763, Azerbaijan
5. Karyakin, 2760, Russia
6. Eljanov, 2742, Ukraine
7. Gelfand, 2741, Israel
8. Nakamura, 2741, USA
9. Shirov, 2735, Spain
10. Hao, 2727, China
Games start at 3 p.m. Msk time (9th of November is rest day).
The World Youth Championship has been taking place from October 19th to 31st. in Halkidiki, Greece (this place brings warm memories to me since that's where I won bronze at the WYCC U18 in 2003). 1387 players aged from 8 to 18 from 87 chess federations took part, including 7 GMs, 2 WGMs, 20 IMs, 15 WIMs, 60 FMs, 57 WFMs, 9 CMs, 17 WCMs. Eighteen countries have won medals of some sort:
What instantly jumps to the eye is that Russia, the clear #1 in the world of chess, has performed extremely poorly. It's hard to say if the main reason for this is lack of attention to young talents' upbringing, or the fact that many eminent players aged under 18 prefer to play in the adult world rather than compete with kids.
Also, there are less "crushers" as opposed to the pre-computer era where you could find a move that changes the evaluation of the position from lost to won. Chess engines have changed the way we treat chess.
I prefer playing my own moves unless they are quickly refuted by the engines. I take a look at the position and find some ideas/plans. Then I try to implement them on the board. Sometimes it runs into a tactical refutation (computers are good at that). If not, then I just play my move without caring what the "best line" provided by the silicon beast is. Also, this is much more entertaining than simply comparing what different engines at different depths are suggesting without thinking about it yourself or learning something new. After all, the World is playing me, not my laptop. 
